Youth Voting in Battleground States

Check out the data in Table 1 on the youth vote in
battleground states in 20161. The average voter turnout for 18-24
year olds was a dismal 43%. Almost two
million youth from 18-34 years old didn’t vote in the close election. As discussed in a previous blog, the
Democrats should have gained about 22 votes for every 100 new youth votes. The
youth vote could have easily swung these swing states if they voted.

Table 1: Youth Vote Turnout in 2016

State

18-24 Year Old Voter Turnout

Total Voter Turnout

18-34 Year Olds That Didn’t Vote

Michigan

37.8%

64.3%

1,104,000

Wisconsin

47.1 %

70.5%

589,000

Pennsylvania

51.4%

62.6%

1,237,000

Florida

37.3%

59.9%

1,974,000

Arizona

40.2%

60.4%

743,000

US Total

43.0%

61.4%

15,353,000

Only 43% of youth from 18-24 voted in 2016. Over fifteen million youth didn’t vote and
Hillary still got almost 3 million more votes than Trump.

If a Get out the Vote effort got 20% more youth to vote, Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania would have swung Democratic. Hillary would have won the Electoral College by 278-260. Getting 20% of the youth to vote could be a challenge, but little differences add up in a close race.

Table 2: Results With 20% More Youth Vote

State

20% of 18-34 Nonvoters

Democratic Votes Gained

Clinton Lost By

Michigan

220,800

48,000

10,704

Wisconsin

117,800

25,900

22,748

Pennsylvania

247,400

54,000

44,292

Florida

394,800

87,000

112,911

Arizona

148,600

32,000

91,234

US

3,070,000

1,465,000

-2,868,519

This table shows that if 20% more of the youth would have voted in 2016, then Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania would have flipped to Clinton.

In 2020, there will be 19 million more Gen Z voters than in 20162. Gen Z eligible voters are more liberal than older generations and 45% non-white4. Gen Z will outnumber everyone born before the Baby Boomers as shown in Figure 2. The problem is that youth are under-voters. Under-voters are groups of people that vote less than their peers. Older voters are over-voters because they outvote their peers. Figure 1 shows how they youth vote have under-voted over the decades.

Figure 1: Under And Over-Voting by Age

This figure shows how the youth usually under-vote by about
5% while elderly voters over-vote by 3-4%.
The difference decreased in 2016.

In 2016, the youth vote of 18-24 year olds made up 12% of the voting population, but they only voted like they were 8.4%. That means they under-voted by 3.6% and that’s a lot in close elections. Figure 1 used different age ranges and got different results than what were available from the Census Bureau. It’s a shame that the youth vote doesn’t turn out when they have the most to win or lose from government policies over their lifetimes.

Table 3: Under-voting in the 2016 Election (Populations in thousands)

AgeRange

Total Citizen Population

Total Votes

% of Electorate

% Who Voted

Under-Vote

Total

224,059

137,537

18 to 24

26,913

11,560

12.0%

8.4%

3.6%

25 to 34

38,283

20,332

17.1%

14.8%

2.3%

35 to 44

34,327

20,662

15.3%

15.0%

0.3%

45 to 64

77,544

51,668

34.6%

37.6%

-3.0%

65+

46,993

33,314

21.0%

24.2%

-3.2%

This table shows how youth under-vote by about 3% while the
elderly over-vote by about 3%.

If the youth would vote, they would be better represented in
government. It’s that simple and they
need to get the message. The hard part
is getting them the message and voting!
That will be a topic in a later blog.

Figure 2: 2020 Electorate

This figure shows how the elderly generations are declining while the younger generations are gaining potential voters from coming of age and immigration3.

Figure 3: Generations Defined

This Pew graphic shows how the generations are defined. The term Post-Millennial is now replaced by Gen Z.